Spectators stand atop the University of Michigan-Flint parking structure to watch a light display at Genesee Towers.MLive.com file photo

FLINT, MI -- Genesee Towers is more than just another office building in downtown Flint -- it's a landmark piece of the city's skyline and should be reused instead of torn down, says historian David White.

Even if it isn't exactly the most beautiful building in town.

"It was an ugly building from the '60s, but when I went to
school we were taught conservation," said White, president of the Genesee County Historical Society. "I favor reskinning the building and reusing it
instead of sending it to the landfill."

With a proposal on the table to demolish Genesee Towers, White is among those advocating the building be reused instead, especially since the city's taxpayers were forced to pay a one-time millage to cover an $8 million legal judgment after the city was court-ordered to take ownership of it.

While city leaders point to engineering studies that show the building has deficiencies, there isn't a study that says the building needs to be demolished.

Like any old building, it needs some work, said White, who was removed from the Downtown Development Authority Board by Brown around the same time the Genesee Towers agreement was approved.

"I just think it's a waste of our taxpayer dollars to see
it demolished," White said. "Flint will never have another building of that size. It would make a great housing development."

Flint emergency manager Michael Brown last month signed off on a development agreement that would transfer the building to the nonprofit Uptown Reinvestment Corp. for $1 to be demolished.

Under the agreement, which hasn't been finalized, Uptown would pay for demolition and the city would contribute $750,000 of its federal community development grant money toward the costs.

But there are many in the community who say the building could be put back into productive reuse if it were marketed in the right way.

Michael Killbreath, president of the Flint Area Chamber of Commerce, said at a recent chamber luncheon that he strongly opposes the proposal to tear the building down.

“I remember when Genesee Towers had 20 floors full of people working jobs,” Killbreath said. “That’s what I want to see happen to the Towers. But when the city sells the building to Uptown for $1 then gives them $750,000 to take it off their hands, that’s not doing anything to bring jobs or people back to the downtown area.”

White pointed out that the tax incentives for redevelopment that
benefited other downtown projects were phased out under Gov. Rick
Snyder, but said a Genesee Towers renovation project could become more viable in the
future.

"We shouldn't be rushing into demolition at a time when politicians have
placed obstacles to community development," he said in an email.

Flint city Councilman Sheldon Neeley said the public should have had some input into the building's fate.

In the scheme of downtown Flint buildings, Genesee Towers is relatively young and should be kept around, he said.

He pointed to the old Durant Hotel, a 1920s-era structure that's now an apartment complex after undergoing $30 million in renovations.

"I would have loved to see (Genesee Towers) rehabbed and used for a better purpose," Neeley said. "In contrast and comparison, the Durant building is the oldest and Genesee Towers is the newest.
If they were able to rehab the oldest one I think they could have done the same with the newest."